


A Place Called Home

by missema



Series: Allyse Shepard, Space Cadet [20]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Citadel, Citadel DLC, F/M, Home, Love, Stress Relief
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-13
Updated: 2013-03-13
Packaged: 2017-12-05 05:06:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/719200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missema/pseuds/missema
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the all settles down again, Kaidan and Allyse find much needed solace away from the Normandy.</p><p>Takes place after the main events of the Citadel DLC, so spoilers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Place Called Home

They don't talk - not really, but they don't have a need for such heaviness, it feels nearly inappropriate. They chat instead, and it's foreign to the both of them, after so many months, or rather years, of war talk and strategic silence and mission briefings.

But Allyse and Kaidan are finally alone in the giant apartment that once belonged to Anderson, and she feels like Allyse there, far more than she does on the ship truth be told. On the Normandy, she was Commander Shepard. Wasn't she resurrected to simply be Commander Shepard the _bloody icon_ and not Allyse Haley Shepard?

The tension that's left its mark in the form of hard worry lines etched into her face starts to ease, replaced with easy laughter and the fatigue that comes from holding it all in for too long. They will relax - because that's what shore leave is for - after they defeated the evil clone. She doesn't want to talk, so he doesn't ask about that, but a new furrow in her brow has settled in since she got shot through the floor of the sushi place.

 _Thanks for that_ , he thinks bitterly. It's not enough to be the spearhead of a war no one believed was coming. Wasn't it enough to nearly die and be brought back? Apparently not, because the first real break they've had, where she wasn't running around on errands and making deals was turned into another mission. It's the only time the Normandy has actually been out of commission and they simply can't go flying away back into battle, and it's the time they have to deal with a psychotic clone and the woman that breathed life into a husk and taught it to hate Shepard.

 _Thanks for that_.

He's not the first to come there, but the last. Time she specifically blocked off for them to be alone together for at least a day. Neither of them wants to waste it, any of it, but especially not the precious space and privacy that she seemingly lucked into.

Kaidan is determined to get that story out of her one day. He's served with Anderson too, and he certainly didn't get any apartments out of it. But there's more there, a depth that is more like kinship than he ever knew, and it went both ways - Allyse talks about Anderson as a cross between mentor and father. But he won't ask about it yet, because they aren't here to talk.

At first, it's apparent what they are there to do. They eat steak after she distracts him in the kitchen, and afterwards, they don't even make it to the bed. Eventually, they find their way there - but not on that first try, where they leave a trail of discarded clothing up the stairs and his kisses make her whimper. She is Allyse and he is Kaidan and they leave everything else behind like the garments that litter the steps and it almost feels like before Ilos again when nothing mattered but that moment.

#####

After that, there still isn't talking. There's sitting in the hot tub, easing the pain from muscles she hadn't relaxed in a while.

Allyse talks about flying with Cortez and fighting in the arena with Jack. She recounts how she and Javik 'accidentally' might have starred in the next Blasto movie, and Kaidan laughs so hard the water shakes and turns into waves, liquid parenthesis surrounding him formed by the force of his laughter. Her arms hurt, and she sheepishly admits that she might have done 183 pullups to beat a record set by Vega.

Kaidan chuckles at that. "Sometimes I forget." He starts, but stops himself, looking away. There's no point in avoiding her, there is simply no place to go save for to get out of the hot tub, and neither of them wants to yet.

"Forget what?" She asks, sliding her leg against his under the water.

He turns back to her, his face a little more closed off than before. "I forget that in your heart, you're still a big sister."

For a moment panic flood her and she wonders if these people - Tali, Chambers, Vega, Cortez, Traynor, hell even EDI, if they are substitutes for Amanda, the sister she lost on Mindoir. Amanda with her big eyes and fondness for all things pink, from the bows in her hair to the flowers their mother grew just outside the kitchen window. She misses her, always, forever. Her crew, they are special, almost family, but not like the hazy memories of her sister. She shakes her head to herself. Never.

She would think more on it, but she doesn't want to think. Allyse spends too much time mourning, and she's learned to let her family have their peace. It's not fair, but when has life ever promised fairness just by virtue of living? As she thinks that, she wiggles her toes under the water and watches Kaidan's face slip when she does.

He's sitting on her foot.

#####

Garrus mentioned the giant windows, but they aren't windows in the traditional sense. He knew that - he lived on the Citadel himself. They give a view out, but they could be programmed to show anything, not just the traffic, but to replicate scenes from any planet. She could pretend she was on Illium, look out the window and see the buildings and trade floor and live in fantasy. Outside could become a serene patch of lavender fields from the south of France if she was in the mood for Earth, or the rocky rubble of Tuchanka. The windows exist for her to see out, not for anyone to look in - looking in only provides a reflection.

She's standing in front of the window after they slept. It could be called morning, if time mattered on a space station. The cup of tea warning her hands feels like morning, and Allyse isn't quite dressed. The N7 sweatshirt Kaidan loved to slide his hands under was back, but there was little underneath, just black panties covering her ass so she could sit comfortably on the stool in the kitchen while the water heated.

Sipping the drink, Allyse looked out the windows, still marveling at the size. On Mindoir, windows were not this size. They were small and made the old way, with regular, breakable glass. Colony life was different, somewhat old fashioned but wonderful in ways. Outside the cars whiz past the huge panels of window, and she's glad it's cars and not green grass, grass set ablaze as batarian voices yell in the distance. She shudders. These used to have cloth curtains to blot everything out.

"What was that?" Kaidan asks, voice closer than she expected. He's at her elbow, drinking coffee and not tea, as if he needed more energy. He's studying her as if he knew what she'd said but didn't understand it.

"I spoke aloud?" She asks in return, and he nods, looking expectant. Shepard takes a breath before she tries to explain. "It was just that the last time I was here, there were curtains on the windows."

"Here?" Kaidan's eyebrow lifts in question, because she never mentioned visiting the apartment before.

She shrugs and looks back out the windows. "Not here specifically, but home." She explains. He's quiet for a second, and Allyse doesn't know if he understands what she means, but there's no way she can explain it better. Home. 

He slips an arm around her waist and presses his chest to her back, chin resting on her shoulder until he wants another drink of coffee. She doesn't say the rest, that it's their home, not solely hers, like it was Anderson and Kahlee's home, now passed down to them.


End file.
